Abstract

"I think, therefore I am.” Descartes’ indubitable proposition has become a cliché
partly because it sounded one of the keynotes of modern philosophy down to the present
day. The proposition also implicitly invokes one of the keynotes of ancient Cynicism: the
individual’s freedom from external determination. Therefore, as the epistemological,
metaphysical and ethical implications of Descartes’ “subjective turn” are explored in
different ways by modern thinkers, there are moments in which they can return to Cynic
themes also: notably individualism, hostility to authority, scepticism, naturalism and indifference to metaphysical transcendence. In this article, we will look briefly at combinations
of these themes in six thinkers from the sixteenth to the late twentieth centuries: Des-
cartes, Rousseau, Hegel, Nietzsche, Foucault and Sloterdijk.